The Anarchical Society

A study of order in world politics must begin with the question: what is it? I shall indicate what I mean by order in social life generally, and proceed to consider what it means in the system of states and in world politics in general.

We have now made it clear what is meant in this study by order in world politics. The question we must now ask is: does it exist?

We have now explained what is meant by order in world politics, and shown that in some measure it exists in the modern system of states. The question to which we shall now turn is: how is it maintained?

Order is not merely an actual or possible condition or state of affairs in world politics, it is also very generally regarded as a value. But it is not the only value in relation to which international conduct can be shaped, nor is it necessarily an overriding one. At the present time, for example, it is often said that whereas the Western powers, in the justifications they offer of their policies, show themselves to be primarily concerned with order, the states of the Third World are primarily concerned with the achievement of justice in the world community, even at the price of disorder. Professor Ali Mazrui, one of the few contemporary writers on international relations to have thought deeply about this question, has said that the Western powers, the principal authors of the United Nations Charter, wrote it in such a way that peace and security are treated as the primary objectives of the organisation, and the promotion of human rights as a secondary objective, whereas the African and Asian states are dedicated to reversing this order of priority.¹

In this chapter I propose to deal with the following questions:

In this chapter I propose to consider the following questions:

In this chapter I propose to consider the following questions:

It may be argued that it is perverse to treat war as an institution of the society of states, but in the sense that it is a settled pattern of behaviour, shaped towards the promotion of common goals, there cannot be any doubt that it has been in the past such an institution, and remains one. In this chapter I propose to consider:

In this chapter I propose to consider the following:

We must begin our inquiry into alternative paths to world order with the question: what forms of universal political organisation, alternative to the present states system, are there? The number of alternatives that can be conceived is, of course, boundless. Here I confine my attention to a few that may be judged significant.

It is often argued today that the states system is in decline, that it is giving place, or will give place, to some fundamentally different form of universal political organisation. What evidence is there that between now and the end of the century the states system is likely to be replaced by one or another of the alternatives discussed in the last chapter?

It is sometimes argued that whether or not the states system is in decline, it is obsolete in the sense of being dysfunctional — that is to say, that it has ceased or is ceasing to be capable of fulfilling the basic ends or goals of man on earth. On this view the states system, whether or not it is judged to have provided a satisfactory means of attaining it in the past, does not now or will not in the future provide a viable path to world order. It follows from this that even if we accept the argument of the last chapter that there is no conclusive evidence that the states system is giving place to an alternative form of universal political organisation, we should nevertheless recognise that the goal of world order requires some alternative, and dedicate ourselves to work for it. This, for example, is the perspective of the editors of a recent series of volumes on The Future of the International Legal Order, Cyril E. Black and Richard A. Falk. It is stated also, with more passion, in Falk’s This Endangered Planet.¹

If the states system seems likely to persist in the foreseeable future, and at the same time is not necessarily destined to become obsolete or dysfunctional, how can it best be reformed or reshaped so as to more effectively promote world order? In this chapter we shall consider some of the possible answers to this question.

It was stated at the outset that the purpose of this inquiry was not to advance any ‘solution’ to the problem of maintaining order in world politics, or to canvass any set of policies as representing ‘the way ahead’. It is evident, however, that the argument has taken a definite direction, and that certain recommendations appear to be implicit in it, or may be read into it. Here I shall state briefly what the direction of the argument has been, but also why it should not be read as a set of prescriptions or recommendations.